Typically, a content overlay, such as a weather emergency notification, is indiscriminately provided by a service provider to a large number of subscribers, or is at most limited by some attribute that applies to a large population of the subscriber base, such as geography. Such widespread and uniform content may be appropriate for certain types of content overlays, such as a weather emergency overlay; however, a personalized content overlay will generally be more effective than a non-personalized content overlay in many scenarios. Considering again the example of a weather emergency overlay, few would argue that an overlay appearing on a television screen stating “John Doe, it has been determined that your house is in the path of a severe storm” would be more effective than an overlay stating “The National Weather Service has issued a weather advisory for a three county region.”
Many advertisers recognize that advertisements targeted for particular populations are more effective within those targeted populations than non-targeted advertisements. For example, a national pizza chain advertisement might be more effective if the advertisement includes a reference to a local pizza outlet where the advertised pizza may be purchased. However, the production cost of video advertisements, such as a television commercial, may preclude the production and distribution of a number of different advertisements, each targeted for a different locality. In some instances, an advertiser may allow a regional or local entity, such as a car dealership, to modify the commercial to include local identification information. However, these modifications may incur substantial costs and must be done prior to providing the advertisement to the local service provider, thereby limiting the extent to which the advertisement can be targeted. For example, even in an average-sized city, a consumer may reside closer to one car dealership than another, and a commercial from a car dealership on the other side of town may not be as effective as a commercial from a car dealership across the street.
One mechanism for targeted advertising involves embedding interactive content, or triggers, into a commercial. When the commercial is played in conjunction with the appropriate equipment, a viewer can select or otherwise activate the trigger, which may then cause a web site containing more personalized information to appear on the television, or may enable the viewer to enter specific information that can be used to provide a more targeted advertising experience. However, such commercials are produced to work on particular equipment, and therefore when played on other equipment may not be operable, or the particular service provider providing the commercial may not have a contract or the means to provide the interactivity, resulting in viewer confusion and dissatisfaction. Moreover, such interactive commercials can only target a particular viewer after the viewer has selected the trigger, and therefore may be insufficient to capture the viewer's interest in the first place. Thus, there is a need to economically modify content, such as an advertisement, so that the content is personalized for a particular subscriber.